A hybrid roller coaster is a category of

roller coaster A roller coaster, or rollercoaster, is a type of amusement ride that employs a form of elevated railroad track designed with tight turns, steep slopes, and sometimes inversions. Passengers ride along the track in open cars, and the rides are o ...

s that is defined as having the track made out of

steel Steel is an alloy made up of iron with added carbon to improve its strength and fracture resistance compared to other forms of iron. Many other elements may be present or added. Stainless steels that are corrosion- and oxidation-resistant ty ...

, while the support structure is made from

wood Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin th ...

. Though less common, this can also be flipped around, with the track made of wood with a steel running plate, and a support structure that is made of steel. An example of this is The Voyage at

Holiday World Holiday World & Splashin' Safari (known as Santa Claus Land prior to 1984) is a combination theme park and water park located near Interstate 64 and U.S. 231 in Santa Claus, Indiana, United States. The theme park is divided into four sections t ...

. The wooden frame-steel track design of roller coaster is mostly known to be utilized by

Rocky Mountain Construction Rocky Mountain Construction, often abbreviated as RMC, is a manufacturing and construction company based in Hayden, Idaho, United States. The company is best known for its I-Box track and Topper Track for wooden roller coasters. History In 200 ...

in their I-Box track design, and Arrow Dynamic's Mine Train style roller coasters. This type of design has several benefits, such as making the ride feel smooth and like that of a steel roller coaster. Hybrid roller coasters can also have inversions, such as

Steel Vengeance Steel Vengeance, formerly known as Mean Streak, is a steel roller coaster at Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio. The roller coaster, originally constructed by Dinn Corporation as a wooden roller coaster, was rebuilt by Rocky Mountain Construction ( ...

Cedar Point Cedar Point is a amusement park located on a Lake Erie peninsula in Sandusky, Ohio, United States. Opened in 1870, it is considered the second-oldest operating amusement park in the U.S. behind Lake Compounce. Cedar Point is owned and op ...

. They also tend to be taller, faster, and have steeper drops than that of wooden coasters.

History

The oldest operating hybrid roller coaster is

Cyclone In meteorology, a cyclone () is a large air mass that rotates around a strong center of low atmospheric pressure, counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere as viewed from above (opposite to an anti ...

Luna Park Luna Park is a name shared by dozens of currently operating and defunct amusement parks. They are named after, and partly based on, the first Luna Park, which opened in 1903 during the heyday of large Coney Island parks. Luna parks are small-sc ...

, opening in 1927, with the track being made from wood and the support structure being made of steel.

Arrow Dynamics Arrow Dynamics was an American manufacturing and engineering company that specialized in designing and building amusement park rides, especially roller coasters. Based in Clearfield, Utah, the company was the successor to Arrow Development (194 ...

built many Mine Train style coasters such as Adventure Express at

Kings Island Kings Island is a amusement park located northeast of Cincinnati in Mason, Ohio, United States. Owned and operated by Cedar Fair, the park first opened in 1972 by the Taft Broadcasting Company. It was part of a larger effort to move and expan ...

in 1991, with the tracks being made of tubular steel, and the support structure being made of wood. Arrow Dynamics continued to build mine trains until 2002 when their last hybrid mine train was built. Most of the modern hybrid coasters being built today are made by Rocky Mountain Construction and

The Gravity Group The Gravity Group is a wooden roller coaster design firm based in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. The firm was founded in July 2002 out of the engineering team of the famed but now defunct Custom Coasters International. The core group of designer ...

. Rocky Mountain Construction makes conversions of old wooden roller coasters to turn them into hybrids with steel track and wooden supports, such as

New Texas Giant New Texas Giant is a steel roller coaster located at Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington, Texas. It originally opened as Texas Giant, which was the tallest wooden roller coaster in the world when it debuted in 1990. Manufactured by Dinn Corporati ...

Six Flags Over Texas Six Flags Over Texas is a 212-acre (86 ha) amusement park, in Arlington, Texas, east of Fort Worth, Texas, Fort Worth and west of Dallas, Texas, Dallas. It is the first amusement park in the Six Flags chain, and features themed areas and attracti ...

. The Gravity Group designs coasters with wooden track but with a steel support structure, such as

Hades 360 Hades 360 is a wooden roller coaster at Mt. Olympus Water & Theme Park in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin. When it opened in 2005, the coaster was known as Hades; it was renamed in 2013 when the 360 degree roll was installed. It is the largest rolle ...

at Mount Olympus Theme Park.

Terminology

The term "hybrid roller coaster" started to be used by the coaster community when New Texas Giant opened and Six Flags classified the roller coaster as wood. Six Flags in response of the confusion classified the roller coaster as a "hybrid", which has since been used to include many other Rocky Mountain Construction Coasters of the same style. Though usually coasters are still classified as either "steel" or "wood", based on what their track material is. The use of the phrase is controversial.

History

Terminology

References

Further reading